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WWOR USA
Not to be confused with the real life local WWOR-TV or the USA Network. ' '''WWOR USA' was a New York City–based American cable television channel that operated as a superstation feed of Secaucus, New Jersey–licensed WWOR-TV (channel 9). The service was uplinked to satellite from the Fox Television Center (WNYW studios) in New York City by owner Fox Television Stations, Inc. The feed was an affiliate of Fox-owned syndication service MyNetworkTV, serving as a default affiliate in cities where the service was not available. On July 21, 2019, the feed was shut down, and the local WWOR-TV was uplinked in its place. In the New York metropolitan area, the superstation feed was not available on local cable providers, but was available to subscribers of Dish and DirecTV. The only exception to this took place on February 26, 1993 after the World Trade Center bombing, when the local WWOR's transmitter was knocked out for the day. Cable providers in the New York metro area used the superstation feed as a substitute until the transmitter returned to service. The feed, under the former WWOR EMI Service branding, was available on one cable system in the New York market from 1990 to 1997, Comcast of Long Beach Island, located just 25 miles north of the border between the New York and Philadelphia markets. On January 1, 1997, the system dropped the national feed and replaced it with the New York City/Secaucus-based WWOR-TV. History 1965 to January 1990 In 1965, Syracuse, NY-based Eastern Microwave began relaying the signal of WOR-TV (channel 9) in New York City via microwave to cable providers located in markets immediately surrounding the New York City metropolitan area, reaching as far west as Buffalo, New York and as far south as Delaware, as well as throughout New England. In April 1979, Eastern began to uplink the signal for satellite and cable subscribers throughout the United States, joining WGN-TV in Chicago and WTBS (now WPCH-TV) in Atlanta as a national superstation. For the eleven years that followed, cable viewers throughout the United States saw the same exact signal that the New York City market saw. Arrival of syndex In 1989, the Federal Communications Commission passed the "Syndication Exclusivity Rights rule" (or "SyndEx") into law. This law meant that whenever a local television station had the exclusive rights to broadcast a syndicated program, that particular program must be blacked out on any out-of-market stations that were carried by local cable providers. After the law was passed, EMI purchased the rights to programs that no stations had claimed exclusive rights to, and launched a special national feed for cable and satellite subscribers outside of the New York City market on January 1, 1990, called the "WWOR EMI Service". Most of the syndicated programs that WWOR-TV had the rights to show in the New York City market were covered up by the alternate programming shown on the national feed – with the exception of sporting events, local newscasts and other WWOR-produced programming such as Steampipe Alley, The Joe Franklin Show, the overnight Shop at Home program, the annual United Cerebral Palsy Telethon, the annual Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, and a select number of programs that were not claimed as exclusive to any market. Most of the programs came from the libraries of Universal Television (whose parent company, MCA Inc., owned WWOR-TV at the time of the EMI Service's founding), MGM Television and Quinn Martin, along with some shows from the Christian Science Monitor's television service, as well as some holdover shows that had aired on the local New York feed before the SyndEx law's passage. This caused confusion among WWOR's cable viewers outside of the New York metropolitan area, as promotions during time periods in which the national feed was simulcasting WWOR's New York signal were left unaltered, leaving in promos for shows that were not airing on the national feed due to the SyndEx law. When channel 9 became a UPN affiliate in 1995, the WWOR EMI Service also covered up the network's shows, due to Paramount (although the network's sole owner-turned-half owner Chris-Craft owned the station) using syndication exclusivity to keep UPN's shows off the national WWOR feed – in contrast, rival superstation WGN carried programming from The WB Television Network on its national feed until nationwide terrestrial coverage was deemed sufficient to discontinue its carriage over the national WGN feed in October 1999. As a result of the syndication exclusivity claims by UPN, if New York City viewers of WWOR saw Star Trek: Voyager, cable viewers throughout the rest of the country saw Hazel reruns in the same timeslot. Sales to AEC and Fox; UPN and MyNetworkTV affiliations In mid-1996, EMI sold the satellite distribution rights to WWOR and Boston's WSBK-TV to Advance Entertainment Corporation subsidiary of Advance Publications, Inc. The look of the station remained the same throughout AEC's ownership, with slight alterations to the logo, removing "EMI Service" from the logo, although the station continued to brand as such during the duration of their ownership. Advance Publications, Inc. announced in 2000 that they would fold AEC and sell the transponder and satellite distribution rights to WWOR. On September 18, 2001, AEC sold the satellite distribution rights to the feed to Fox Television Stations, Inc, ironically on the same day Fox purchased the local WWOR feed in Secaucus, NJ. AEC had been under contract by former WWOR-TV owner Chris-Craft to uplink the feed, a contract that would have expired in 2003; the sale to Fox put the feed under common ownership with its parent station, thus nullifying the contract. Fox then overhauled the feed and moved the uplink facilities from Syracuse to the Fox Television Center in New York City, home of WWOR sister station WNYW. Fox uplinked a completely separate signal for viewers outside of the New York area, no longer simulcasting any of the New York feed. Some syndex-free shows continue to air on both feeds simultaneously, but commercials on both feeds are completely different, putting an end to the confusion from the EMI and AEC eras and eliminating promos for shows not airing on the national feed as well as local New York City area-based commercials. The per-inquiry phone order ads that always aired during the EMI/AEC era were replaced with more common commercials usually found on other cable and broadcast networks, as Fox began selling advertising time to the same companies they sell advertising to for their owned broadcast and cable stations. Since this time, the presentation of the national feed has resembled that of the local feed, with the same voiceover heard on both feeds. Fox then reached a deal with then-UPN owner Viacom for full signal rights to the network's schedule, making the feed an affiliate of UPN for the first time, as the original syndex restrictions invoked by original network half owner Paramount in 1995 were set to expire in early 2002. Viacom opted not to renew the restrictions, as the network was still either unavailable or was being carried in late night timeslots (usually 11pm to 1am) on stations primarily affiliated with the Big Four networks (ABC, NBC, FOX, and sister network CBS) in several markets. The UPN affiliation took effect on January 7, 2002. The first UPN program on Superstation WWOR was The Hughleys, at 8pm Eastern. A number of substitute shows that had been a staple of the channel under EMI and AEC ownership, such as Dragnet, Charles in Charge, and other reruns of shows from the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s were replaced with first run substitute programming and some recent off-network reruns. Fox would rebrand the feed as "Superstation WWOR." Superstation WWOR and its new cable sister Fox News Channel would then begin to cross promote, with both channels airing commercials for each other's programming. When the local feed picked up New York Yankees baseball in 2005, the games also aired on the superstation feed, same as when the station had the rights to Mets games. When CBS Corporation (owners of UPN) and Time Warner (owners of The WB) announced they were selling their WB and UPN networks to Turner and Viacom and launching a new network, The CW, in 2006, WPIX became the New York market's affiliate for the new network. Fox would announce MyNetworkTV in February. MyNetworkTV aired on the superstation feed to fill holes in markets that do not have an affiliate. The feed was replaced in Canada with the local WWOR-TV New York feed on September 11, 2007. In 2010, the feed was rebranded again, to WWOR USA. Fox made deals with distributors of programs on the New York feed to increase WWOR's full signal rights to shows that were airing on the New York feed, with about 50% of the local feed's programs cleared to air on WWOR USA. The only WWOR-TV program that was not protected by syndex that the superstation feed did not air was Chasing News. This was due to the program being focused on the state of New Jersey; the superstation feed was focused on the national audience, despite having previously aired WWOR-TV's newscasts until the news department was shut down in 2013. Fox replaced My9 News on WWOR USA with reruns of Family Guy at 10pm Eastern, which was moved to 10:30pm Eastern on February 6, 2017 to accommodate a new national newscast produced by sister cable network Fox News Channel . The only substitute programming holdovers on the feed from the EMI/AEC era were Magnum PI (which the NYC feed dropped in fall 1996 but was picked up by EMI immediately to keep the show available to national viewers), Please Don't Eat the Daisies, and The Love Boat. Comedy Wheel, which aired on the feed from 1990 to 1993, was brought back when Fox purchased the feed, but was now airing a wider variety of sitcoms from the 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s, including sitcoms that formerly aired on the New York feed but were covered up by EMI and AEC due to syndex claims. While the EMI era Comedy Wheel only aired little known and forgotten shows, the Fox era version aired more prominent sitcoms from over the years (Odd Couple (The original 1970-1975 version), Taxi, The Cosby Show, Too Close for Comfort, Who's the Boss, Friends, etc.). Since 2014, attempts have been made to repeal the Syndicated Exclusivity Rule along with the Network Non-duplication rule. A ruling had not been made as yet. Fox announced that if the SyndEx rule was repealed, WWOR USA would continue broadcasting separately from WWOR-TV outside of the metropolitan New York City market, but will significantly limit substitute programming, both feeds sharing 90 to 95% of programming, while still retaining national advertising on the cable feed separate from the local advertising on the New York feed, much like the local WTBS 17 in Atlanta and the national Superstation WTBS did throughout the 1980s prior to the reinstatement of SyndEx in 1990. On September 4th, 2016, WWOR USA launched a Sunday Night animation block not unlike what was aired on sister network FOX a few years earlier, only airing all reruns, airing from 7 to 10pm Eastern. Shows featured in the block included The Simpsons, The Flintstones (the rights to which leased from Time Warner; previously aired on the feed under EMI ownership from 1993 to 1995), Family Guy, American Dad, King of the Hill, and South Park (leased from Comedy Central). Replacement with WWOR-TV New York market feed On July 21, 2019, Fox shut down the national WWOR USA feed and uplinked the local New York City market feed in its place. This marks the first time the New York feed was available nationally since SyndEx went into effect in 1990. The station is subject to SyndEx blackouts on systems outside of the New York market carrying the station. Newscasts From the time the New York City feed was uplinked until 2013, the superstation feed always simulcast WWOR-TV's New York City area local newscasts. This ended when WWOR-TV shut down their in-house news department in favor of airing a New Jersey-focused newsmagazine, Chasing News, which was not simulcast on WWOR USA. As mentioned above, from February 6, 2017 to March 24, 2017, WWOR USA once again aired a half hour newscast at 10pm Eastern from Monday through Friday, produced by sister cable network FOX News Channel. The newscasts were national newscasts, a departure from the previous WWOR-TV produced New York metro area-based newscasts that were previously simulcast on the feed. The newscasts were anchored by Brit Hume, going under the title "FOX News Tonight on WWOR USA." The newscasts aired live from FOX News headquarters in New York City. The experiment failed, and WWOR USA replaced the newscast and Family Guy in the 10pm eastern hour with previous season reruns of Family Feud with Steve Harvey on March 27, which also aire in that hour on the local feed. WWOR USA HD WWOR USA HD was a high definition simulcast feed of WWOR USA, which broadcast programming available in HD in the 720p picture format, just like its metro New York City parent station. Original programming and select acquired programs were broadcast in high definition on the feed. The HD feed was available regionally through Spectrum, Xfinity by Comcast, AT&T U-verse, Verizon FiOS and other select cable providers, and nationally through satellite providers DirecTV and Dish. Past logos Category:New York City Category:New Jersey Category:Former UPN affiliates Category:Former independent stations Category:Superstations in the United States Category:Fox Television Stations Category:MyNetworkTV affiliated stations Category:Television channels and stations established in 1965 Category:Cable channels Category:Defunct TV Stations Category:Defunct Superstation feeds Category:Defunct Cable Networks